Clinton's advice to Barack Obama

Bill Clinton's advice to Barack Obama By: John F. Harris and edited by Michael Brittingham September 12, 2008 07:43 AM EST

There they were in Harlem Thursday, the 42nd president and the Democrat who hopes to be the 44th, for a two-hour lunch hour chat at Bill Clinton’s office. It is not at all clear that Barack Obama particularly wants Clinton’s advice about how to win the presidency—after all, he kept the former president at a cool distance, with just occasional phone calls, for months—but many Democrats believe it is increasingly clear that he could use it. The fact that Obama is even with or behind John McCain despite so many favorable trends for Democrats shows that there is still plenty he could learn from the master—the political Houdini who is the only Democrat since Franklin D. Roosevelt to win two terms. We do know that Clinton was happy to share his thoughts. He recently shared ten minutes of “here’s what Obama needs to do” wisdom while standing in the popcorn line with someone he just met at a New York movie theater, according to one Democrat privy to the conversation. The Clinton-Obama meeting was closed. We don’t know for sure what they said. But it is not hard to make an educated guess. Here, based on 16 years experience watching Bill Clinton campaign—and interviews with a half-dozen veterans of his political teams—is a reasonably safe bet about his campaign advice to Barack Obama: 1. Don’t make this about you. Clinton is always skeptical of politicians who try to win races on the basis of their life story or supposed personal virtues. Those can be nice side dishes (“The Man from Hope”) but they can’t be the main entrée. Voters just don’t care that much about you, they care about themselves and what you will do for them. Clinton believes, plausibly, that this is why he emerged from sex scandals and all manner of other controversies with his job approval ratings intact. See Also Obama vows new 'speed and ferocity' Obama to pressure McCain on openness Together, McCain and Obama honor 9/11 Pre-Game: Today's strategies “What Bill Clinton always told me is, ‘If we make this about their lives instead of mine, we’ll be better off,” recalled Paul Begala, who served as strategist in the 1992 election and the second-term White House. “It’s always about the voters, never about the candidates.” What’s more, the politics of biography can turn in an instant, as happened to John F. Kerry in 2004 when what was supposed to be an asset—Kerry’s Vietnam service—was turned into a distraction and even liability by the Swift Boat Veterans. Clinton thinks Obama has erred by putting too much focus on himself, and on his supposedly transformational brand of politics—it’s too airy, and puts him at risk of being branded a hypocrite when, as inevitably happens, he needs to play rough. 2. Define yourself through policies—yours and theirs. Clinton would often dismiss proposed speech drafts handed him by his staff writers with a mocking phrase, “Words, words words!” He has never thought much of Obama’s rhetoric-driven campaign. While Obama has plenty of policy proposals, there are not many that he has managed to make recognizable signatures, the way Clinton promised to “end welfare as we know it” in 1992. Most people know Obama claims to represent “Change you can believe in.” But Clinton believes people won’t believe him—or any politician—unless change is defined with specificity. That means describing, in language that sounds plausible rather than partisan, what you believe in versus what the other guy believes in. 3. Have more fun. Bill and Hillary Clinton are both obsessed with how—as they see it—Republicans have perfected the art of the bogus attack, the distracting wedge issue, “the politics of personal destruction.” From the Clinton vantage point, both Al Gore in 2000 and John Kerry in 2004 lost when they allowed Republicans to get under their skins and hijack their public images. Obama has hinted that he believes that, too, and has signaled that he will fight back hard. But that is not as easy at it might sound. A candidate needs to do more than just complain about the unfairness of it all, as when Obama this week shouted “enough!” and denounced “lies, outrage and swift-boat politics.” The trick is counter-punching without looking rattled, and without letting your opponents set the agenda of the conversation. Though he did not always follow his own advice, Clinton believes humor is one tool that can help a politician connect with audiences and convey toughness rather than whininess. Mark Penn, the Clintons’ long-time pollster and strategist, said Obama may have listened too closely to people urging him to “fight back, fight back.” “He’s got to learn how to completely eviscerate the guy with a smile,” he said. 4. Make the election about something big. It’s a mistake, Clinton believes, for a presidential nominee of one party to be arguing about the vice presidential nominee of the other party, as Obama has been over Sarah Palin in recent days. The best way for Obama to convince people he’s ready to be president is by talking about ideas that sound presidential. During both his presidential runs, Clinton gave major speeches at Georgetown University that were not partisan or even in the strict sense political—they were wide-ranging discourses about where the United States stood at that moment in history. Clinton believes Obama is on losing terrain if he allows the election to be about pigs and lipstick. Obama needs to soar above that by talking about large themes like energy and global warming, and how to harness the opportunities of a global economy. 5. Spend more time speaking to your opponents. Most Democrats, Clinton believes, spend too much time enjoying the cheers of the home crowd—and not enough trying to persuade people who do not already agree with them. One of his favorite rhetorical tactics is to appear to be describing an opponent’s ideas in ways that sound perfectly fair and reasonable—as a prelude to why the opponent is dead wrong. Successful politicians, he believes, look for opportunities to speak to skeptical audiences. Clinton went to New Hampshire to talk to gun owners—even though many hunters there were furious over passage of a crime bill that hunters feared would take away their guns. “All our guys in Washington, thought I was crazier than the March Hare,” Clinton once told me and Mark Halperin. “And they said, ‘Well, you don’t want to talk about this.’ I said, ‘Oh, yes, I do.’” Obama’s convention speech in Denver was a spirited performance that thrilled Democrats, but did not have enough passages aimed at people who don’t already support him. What’s more, Obama has not taken enough positions that make clear he is not a standard-issue Democrat. 6. Don’t take Hillary voters for granted. Obama’s strategists believed that they did not have to worry that much about Hillary Clinton’s women backers, because they figured that most of them were liberal, abortion-rights supporters who will vote for the Democrat even if the nominee was not their first choice. That was probably true for about two-thirds of those voters, according to one Clinton strategist’s appraisal of polling data. But another one-third of Clinton’s women supporters were more conservative-tilting working-class women, who were drawn to Clinton because they admired her pluck—and these voters are now a key target group for McCain-Palin. 7. Stop smoking whatever it is you are smoking. In his cool treatment of both Clintons over the summer, and in the way he allowed expectations among Democrats and the news media to build, Obama has acted as if he were on a glide path to a relatively easy victory. Clinton knows this attitude is delusional. Someone who grew up in Arkansas as the state—and much of the South—was growing more conservative, can never forget how hard it is for Democrats to win in what for the past two generations has been a center-right part of the country. Democrats have only won more than 50 percent in a presidential election there twice since 1944. Republicans have done it seven times. One important thing to remember: Obama has never faced a serious race against a Republican. His important victories in Illinois and this year have all been against other Democrats in nomination battles. Some Clinton allies say this may tend to warp his perspective about how politics works, and what kind of issues and stories matter in a presidential context. Bottom line: it does not matter who is getting better coverage in the New York Times. “This is a new experience for Obama – facing a Republican who will do and say things far different from the Democrats he has faced – Republicans don’t care what Frank Rich, Maureen Dowd or establishment media has to say about them,” said Penn.   8. And while you are it, give me an apology. The meeting in Harlem was friendly, and Obama could have hardly hoped for a more lavish endorsement than he got from Clinton at the Democratic convention in Denver. But he errs if he thinks the former president does not still have resentments toward Obama, and that those resentments might not surface at unwelcome times, in the view of many former aides. Simply put, Clinton will never be fully at peace with Obama until the Democratic nominee makes clear—in emphatic words, in public—that Clinton is not in any way racist, and did not try to “play the race card” during the Democratic nomination contest, as some commentators have suggested. There’s no question that Clinton was impolitic in comparing Obama’s victory in South Carolina to Jesse Jackson’s victory 20 years earlier. But Clinton is understandably outraged that people would argue this remark negated a career-long commitment to racial equality—and that Obama stood by mute while such charges were made. Clinton swallowed his medicine with his speech for Obama in Denver. Obama has still not fully swallowed his by making a public defense of Clinton on race. Harris, the editor in chief of Politico, has written two books about Bill Clinton and his politics, “The Survivor: Bill Clinton in the White House,”  and “The Way to Win; Taking the White House in 2008.”

© 2008 Capitol News Company, LLC

Why Jesse Jackson Hates Obama...

Graphic by Martin Kozlowski
Article by SHELBY STEELE Edited by Michael Brittingham
July 22, 2008;

A few weeks ago, the Rev. Jesse Jackson made something of a fool of himself. There he was -- a historical figure in his own right -- threatening the castration of Barack Obama. It was sad to see.

If I have often criticized Mr. Jackson, I have also, reservedly, admired him. He is a late 20th century outcropping of a profoundly American archetype: the self-invented man who comes from nothing and, out of sheer force of personality, imposes himself on the American consciousness. If he never reached the greatness to which he aspired, he nevertheless did honor to the enduring American tradition of bold and unapologetic opportunism.

But now -- not looking old so much as a bit lost within the new Obama aura -- it is clear that Jesse Jackson has come to a kind of dénouement. Some force that once buoyed him up now seems spent.

Mr. Jackson was always a challenger. He confronted American institutions (especially wealthy corporations) with the shame of America's racist past and demanded redress. He could have taken up the mantle of the early Martin Luther King (he famously smeared himself with the great man's blood after King was shot), and argued for equality out of a faith in the imagination and drive of his own people. Instead -- and tragically -- he and the entire civil rights establishment pursued equality through the manipulation of white guilt.

Their faith was in the easy moral leverage over white America that the civil rights victories of the 1960s had suddenly bestowed on them. So Mr. Jackson and his generation of black leaders made keeping whites "on the hook" the most sacred article of the post-'60s black identity.

They ushered in an extortionist era of civil rights, in which they said to American institutions: Your shame must now become our advantage. To argue differently -- that black development, for example, might be a more enduring road to black equality -- took whites "off the hook" and was therefore an unpardonable heresy. For this generation, an Uncle Tom was not a black who betrayed his race; it was a black who betrayed the group's bounty of moral leverage over whites. And now comes Mr. Obama, who became the first viable black presidential candidate precisely by giving up his moral leverage over whites.

Mr. Obama's great political ingenuity was very simple: to trade moral leverage for gratitude. Give up moral leverage over whites, refuse to shame them with America's racist past, and the gratitude they show you will constitute a new form of black power. They will love you for the faith you show in them.

So it is not hard to see why Mr. Jackson might have experienced Mr. Obama's emergence as something of a stiletto in the heart. Mr. Obama is a white "race card" -- moral leverage that whites can use against the moral leverage black leaders have wielded against them for decades. He is the nullification of Jesse Jackson -- the anti-Jackson.

And Mr. Obama is so successful at winning gratitude from whites precisely because Mr. Jackson was so successful at inflaming and exploiting white guilt. Mr. Jackson must now see his own oblivion in the very features of Mr. Obama's face. Thus the on-camera threat of castration, followed by the little jab of his fist as if to deliver a stiletto of his own.

And then Mr. Obama took it further by going to the NAACP with a message of black responsibility -- this after his speech on the need for black fathers to take responsibility for the children they sire. "Talking down to black people," Mr. Jackson mumbled.

Normally, "black responsibility" is a forbidden phrase for a black leader -- not because blacks reject responsibility, but because even the idea of black responsibility weakens moral leverage over whites. When Mr. Obama uses this language, whites of course are thankful. Black leaders seethe.

Nevertheless, Mr. Obama's sacrifice of black leverage has given him a chance to actually become the president. He has captured the devotion of millions of whites in ways that black leveragers never could. And the great masses of blacks -- blacks outside today's sclerotic black leadership -- see this very clearly. Until Mr. Obama, any black with a message of black responsibility would be called a "black conservative" and thereby marginalized. After Obama's NAACP speech, blacks flooded into the hotel lobby thanking him for "reminding" them of their responsibility.

Thomas Sowell, among many others, has articulated the power of individual responsibility as an antidote to black poverty for over 40 years. Black thinkers as far back as Frederick Douglas and Booker T. Washington have done the same. Why then, all of a sudden, are blacks willing to openly embrace this truth -- and in the full knowledge that it will weaken their leverage with whites?

I think the answer is that Mr. Obama potentially offers them something far more profound than mere moral leverage. If only symbolically, he offers nothing less than an end to black inferiority. This has been an insidious spiritual torment for blacks because reality itself keeps mockingly proving the original lie. Barack Obama in the Oval Office -- a black man governing a largely white nation -- would offer blacks an undreamed-of spiritual solace far more meaningful than the petty self-importance to be gained from moral leverage.

But white Americans have also been tormented by their stigmatization as moral inferiors, as racists. An Obama presidency would give them considerable moral leverage against this stigma.

So it has to be acknowledged that, on the level of cultural and historical symbolism, an Obama presidency might nudge the culture forward a bit -- presuming of course that he would be at least a competent president. (A less-than-competent black president would likely be a step backwards.) It would be a good thing were blacks to be more open to the power of individual responsibility. And it would surely help us all if whites were less cowed by the political correctness on black issues that protects their racial innocence at the expense of the very principles that made America great. We Americans are hungry for such a cultural shift.

This, no doubt, is what Barack Obama means by "change." He promises to reconfigure our exhausted cultural arrangement.

But here lies his essential contradiction: His campaign is more cultural than political. He sells himself more as a cultural breakthrough than as a candidate for office. To be a projection screen for the cultural aspirations of both blacks and whites one must be an invisible man politically. Real world politics, in their mundanity, interrupt cultural projections. And so Mr. Obama's political invisibility -- a charm that can only derive from a lack of deep political convictions -- may well serve his cultural appeal, but it also makes him something of a political mess.

Already he has flip-flopped on campaign financing, wire-tapping, gun control, faith-based initiatives, and the terms of withdrawal from Iraq. Those enamored of his cultural potential may say these reversals are an indication of thoughtfulness, or even open-mindedness. But could it be that this is a man who trusted so much in his cultural appeal that the struggles of principle and conscience never seemed quite real to him? His flip-flops belie an almost existential callowness toward principle, as if the very idea of permanent truth is passé, a form of bad taste.

John McCain is simply a man of considerable character, poor guy. He is utterly bereft of cultural cachet. Against an animating message of cultural "change," he is retrogression itself. Worse, Mr. Obama's trick is to take politics off the table by moving so politically close to his opponent that only culture is left to separate them. And, unencumbered as he is by deep attachment to principle, he can be both far-left and center-right. He can steal much of Mr. McCain's territory.

Mr. Obama has already won a cultural mandate to the American presidency. And politically, he is now essentially in a contest with himself. His challenge is not Mr. McCain; it is the establishment of his own patriotism, trustworthiness and gravitas. He has to channel a little Colin Powell, and he no doubt hopes his trip to the Middle East and Europe will reflect him back to America with something of Mr. Powell's stature. He wants even Middle America to feel comfortable as the mantle they bestow on him settles upon his shoulders.

Mr. Steele is a research fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution and the author of "A Bound Man: Why We Are Excited About Obama and Why He Can't Win" (Free Press, 2007).

Former Republican N.C. Sen. Jesse Helms dies at 86

Former Republican N.C. Sen. Jesse Helms dies at 86
BY DAVID ESPO and WHITNEY WOODWARD, Associated Press Writers and edited by Michael Brittingham

RALEIGH, N.C. July 4, 2008 - Former Sen. Jesse Helms, who built a career along the fault lines of racial politics and battled liberals, Communists and the occasional fellow Republican during 30 conservative years in Congress, died on the Fourth of July.

Jessie was a great American and a true patriot of our nation. I had both the honor and privilege of working with him on his 1984 Senate campaign and he opened my eyes to conservatism, by telling me once that 'conservatives' are simply people who have values that they wish too conserve. It is entirely fitting that he leaves us on July 4th, and I only wish that those in heaven find him as engaging as many of us did... 'down here' :-) Michael Brittingham



He was 86.

Helms died at 1:15 a.m. on July fourth, 2008, said the Jesse Helms Center at Wingate University in North Carolina.

"He was very comfortable," said former chief of staff Jimy Broughton, who added Helms died of natural causes in Raleigh.

Helms, who first became known to North Carolina voters as a newspaper and television commentator, won election to the Senate in 1972 and decided not to run for a sixth term in 2002.



As he aged, Helms was slowed by a variety of illnesses, including a bone disorder, prostate cancer and heart problems, and he made his way through the Capitol on a motorized scooter as his career neared an end. In April 2006, his family announced that he had been moved into a convalescent center after being diagnosed with vascular dementia, in which repeated minor strokes damage the brain.

The center said funeral arrangements were pending.



AP Special Writer David Espo contributed in Washington contributed to this story.

Jesse Helms quotes on life and politics

Some quotes of Jesse Helms, who died on the Fourth of July at age 86:

"I'm so old-fashioned I believe in horse whipping." — During a debate in 1991 on an AIDS-related amendment.

"Well, there is no joy in Mudville tonight. The mighty ultraliberal establishment, and the liberal politicians and editors and commentators and columnists, have struck out again." — Helms after defeating black Democrat Harvey Gantt for Senate in 1990.

"I came up between the two world wars during the Depression. All the people around me emphasized working and savings and personal responsibility. They spelled out in one way or another the uniqueness of America. This has largely been lost. Nobody would have thought of turning to the government to solve all our problems." — 1984 interview.

"The destruction of this country can be pinpointed in terms of its beginnings to the time that our political leadership turned to socialism. They didn't call it socialism, of course. It was given deceptive names and adorned with fancy slogans. We heard about New Deals, and Fair Deals and New Frontiers and the Great Society." — From a Helms editorial at WRAL-TV in Raleigh.



"I shall always remember the shady streets, the quiet Sundays, the cotton wagons, the Fourth of July parades, the New Year's Eve firecrackers. I shall never forget the stream of school kids marching uptown to place flowers on the Courthouse Square monument on Confederate Memorial Day." — Helms writing in 1956 on life in his hometown of Monroe, N.C.

"If he taught us anything, he taught us that we are personally responsible and accountable. I remember that day, and always will, when he called in several from the senior class. ... He said you can make it in this country. He said it's going to take hard work. ... He said you're going to succeed. He said you'll own your own homes and you'll have two cars and all that. I thought this man had lost his mind." — Helms reflecting on his high school principal.

"Compromise, hell! That's what has happened to us all down the line — and that's the very cause of our woes. If freedom is right and tyranny is wrong, why should those who believe in freedom treat it as if it were a roll of bologna to be bartered a slice at a time?" — Helms writing in 1959 on compromise in politics.

"To rob the Negro of his reputation of thinking through a problem in his own fashion is about the same as trying to pretend that he doesn't have a natural instinct for rhythm and for singing and dancing." — Helms responding in 1956 to criticism that a fictional black character in his newspaper column was offensive.

Obama courts conservatives with new faith program

Obama courts conservatives with new faith program
By JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writer and edited by Michael Brittingham
1 hour, 30 minutes ago

Taking a page from President Bush, Democrat Barack Obama said Tuesday he wants to expand White House efforts to steer social service dollars to religious groups, risking protests in his own party with his latest aggressive reach for voters who usually vote Republican.

Obama contended he is merely stating long-held positions — surprising to some, he said, after a primary campaign in which he was "tagged as being on the left."

In recent days, with the Democratic nomination in hand and the general election battle with Republican John McCain ahead, Obama has been sounding centrist themes with comments on guns, government surveillance and capital punishment. He's even quoted Ronald Reagan.

On Tuesday, touring Presbyterian Church-based social services facility, the Democratic senator said he would get religious charities more involved in government anti-poverty efforts if elected.

"We need an all-hands-on-deck approach," he said at Eastside Community Ministry.

The event was part of a series leading into Friday's Fourth of July holiday aimed at reassuring skeptical voters and shifting away from being stamped as part of the Democratic Party's most liberal wing.

He said the connection of religion and public service was nothing new in his personal life.

Obama showed he was comfortable using the kind of language that is familiar in evangelical churches and Bible studies by calling his faith "a personal commitment to Christ." He said that his time as a community organizer in decimated Chicago neighborhoods, supported in part by a Catholic group, brought him to a deeper faith and also convinced him that faith is useless without works.

"While I could sit in church and pray all I want, I wouldn't be fulfilling God's will unless I went out and did the Lord's work," he declared.

His talk on faith in the battleground state of Ohio came a day after a speech on patriotism in Missouri, another November election battleground. Wednesday, he travels to Colorado Springs, Colo., a hub of conservative Christian organizations, for a speech focused on service.

With 80 percent of Americans saying they identify themselves with some religion, Obama's campaign has struggled with the topic.

Comments critical of America by Obama's longtime pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, caused a firestorm during the primaries and brought Obama's brand of faith under scrutiny because of Wright's adherence to black liberation theology. Obama also has battled false but persistent rumors that he is a Muslim; they have been kept alive on the Internet despite his repeated talk about his longtime devotion to Christianity.

Conservative Christians make up about a quarter of the electorate, and they helped put Bush in office twice. Many still are likely to oppose the Democratic nominee because of his support for abortion rights, gay rights and other issues.

An AP-Yahoo News poll in June found that people who attend church at least once a week support Republican McCain over Obama, 49 percent to 37 percent. Those who attend church less often tend to favor Obama. White evangelical Christians who attend church weekly favor McCain by huge margins.

Still, the Obama camp notes that some evangelicals feel passionately about aggressive environmental stewardship, an issue more commonly associated with Democrats. Others find appeal in Obama's message about ending messy political divisions.

Obama recently won the endorsement of the Rev. Kirbyjon Caldwell, leader of a Methodist megachurch in Houston who is very close to Bush.

McCain is a mostly reliable conservative vote, but he isn't as passionate or vocal about religious conservatives as some would like. He also famously upbraided some Christian evangelical leaders as "agents of intolerance" in his first presidential campaign. He has sought to make amends since then and is continuing his outreach efforts. He met with world-renowned evangelist Billy Graham last weekend.

Obama's high-profile embrace of a key theme of Bush's time in office — the "faith-based initiative" — is just the latest example of him trying to show his centrist side.

Last week, he quoted Reagan, saying "we have to trust but verify" after Bush lifted trade sanctions against North Korea and moved to remove the country from the U.S. terrorism list.

Obama also supported new electronic surveillance rules for the government's eavesdropping program, saying "an important tool in the fight against terrorism will continue," after opposing a similar bill last year. After the Supreme Court overturned the District of Columbia's gun ban, he said he favors both an individual's right to bear firearms as well as a government's right to regulate them.

On Iraq, he has gone from hard-edged, vocal opposition to more nuanced rhetoric that calls for a phased-out troop drawdown that could last 16 months. He also disagreed with the Supreme Court decision last week that struck down a Louisiana law allowing capital punishment for people who rape children under 12.

Speaking with reporters, Obama disputed that he is altering views.

"I get tagged as being on the left and, when I simply describe what has been my position consistently, then suddenly people act surprised," he said. "But there hasn't been substantial shifts there."

While Obama would expand Bush's efforts to give religious charities more equal footing when getting federal funding, he also would tweak what he would call the President's Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships in ways that divert from Bush's approach.

He would increase spending on social services, starting with a $500 million-a-year program to keep 1 million poor children up to speed on their studies over the summers. He would increase training for charities applying for funding and make it a grass-roots effort. He would elevate the program to be "a critical part of my administration," a reference to criticism that Bush paid barely more than lip service to his effort.

Obama also chose a different emphasis for why religious charities are an important answer to solving poverty and other social problems: because they better know the people who are hurting, instead of Bush's argument that religion itself is a transforming power the government must not be afraid to harness.

And while Bush supports allowing all religious groups to make any employment decisions based on faith, Obama proposes allowing religious institutions to hire and fire based on religion only in the non-taxpayer-funded portions of their activities — consistent with current federal, state and local laws. "That makes perfect sense," he said.

Where there are state or local laws prohibiting hiring choices based on sexual orientation in the federally funded portion of the programs, he said he would support those being applied.

This position would make his proposal "dead on arrival" for many evangelicals and small churches, said Jim Towey, a former head of Bush's faith-based office. That's because telling a small organization to keep employees hired with federal funds separate from others "is unmanageable — and besides those folks want to hire people who share their vision and mission," Towey said.

Even as Obama courts the right, his support for a signature Bush program could invite protest from others.

"This initiative has been a failure on all counts, and it ought to be shut down, not expanded," said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Associated Press writer Liz Sidoti contributed to this story from Washington.

Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

Gore endorses Obama and attacks Bush in Detroit

Gore endorses Obama and attacks Bush in Detroit
By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press Writer and edited by Michael Brittingham - President/The Obama Republicans
Mon Jun 16, 10:32 PM ET

Al Gore made his debut in the 2008 presidential campaign Monday night, encouraging voters to back Barack Obama because "take it from me, elections matter."

The former vice president's speech at the Joe Louis Arena was part endorsement and part blistering attack on the man who denied him the White House eight years ago.

"After eight years of incompetence, neglect and failure, we need change," Gore said. "After eight years when our Constitution has been dishonored and disrespected, we need changes."

In 2000, Gore won the popular vote but lost the disputed election to George W. Bush, who captured Florida and its electoral votes after a divided Supreme Court ended the re-count of ballots. Since then, Gore has made combatting global warming his signature issue, and has been recognized worldwide for his effort — from an Academy Award to the Nobel Prize.

Obama stoked lasting Democratic anger over the 2000 outcome when he recognized Gore as "the winner of the popular vote for president."
"You remember that," Obama said as the crowd of 20,000 erupted in raucous applause.

Gore is one of the most popular figures in the Democratic Party, but he stayed out of the primary campaign.

It's the second time Obama has rolled out a major endorsement in Michigan, where he did not campaign during the primary because its election violated the party rules. Obama is counting on a win in Michigan in November, but brought Gore and 2004 vice presidential nominee John Edwards to help validate him among Democrats in the state after skipping their primary.

"I'm grateful Al Gore came to Detroit tonight," Obama said. "But I'm ever more grateful for everything he's done in the last 40 years for this country."

Gore announced his decision in a fundraising e-mail earlier Monday. "From now through Election Day, I intend to do whatever I can to make sure he is elected president of the United States," Gore wrote.

Gore told the rally that the Democratic primary was a contest between a strong and inspiring field of candidates, but "now we've made our choice."

He said Republican candidate John McCain deserves respect for all he has done for this country and for his willingness to debate his party on climate change and other critical issues. But he said the 71-year-old McCain's "age and experience" aren't the same as Obama's judgment, noting the Democrat's early opposition to the Iraq war.

He said Republicans criticized President Kennedy for being too young and inexperienced to be president as well, but Kennedy noted that Thomas Jefferson, George Washington and Christopher Columbus all accomplished great things before they reached their mid-40s.

"I feel your determination after two terms of the Bush-Cheney administration to change the direction of our country," he said. He accused Bush of myriad missteps, including a botched response to Hurricane Katrina, economic problems, foreign policy mistakes and allowing lead-tainted toys and poisoned pet food in from China.

"Even our dogs and cats have learned that elections matter," he said. "This election matters more than ever because America needs change more than ever."

The Republican Party pointed out that Gore's 2000 running mate, Sen. Joe Lieberman, has since left the Democratic Party and become an independent and is backing McCain.

In response to Gore's harsh critique of Bush, GOP spokesman Alex Conant said, "This election isn't about changing the past, it's about changing the future. It's telling that half of the 2000 Democratic ticket endorsed John McCain early in the campaign, while the other half waited until Barack Obama had been the presumptive nominee for weeks." Obama clinched the nomination on June 3.

Obama and Gore were introduced by Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, who backed Hillary Rodham Clinton in the primary. She held up a navy blue pump and said, on behalf of women everywhere, that she was proud to say she's supporting Obama.

She was loudly booed at the mention of Clinton's name, and Obama chastised the crowd for that when he spoke. He said he's a better candidate for having run against Clinton.

"She's tough," he said. "That's why this race took so long. She's a fighter. And we need fighters in the Democratic Party because we've got a lot to fight for."

On the Net:
http://obamarepublicans.ning.com

http://www.barackobama.com

Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

Hillary Rodham Clinton suspended her pioneering campaign for the presidency

AP Photo

Clinton suspends campaign, endorses Obama

By BETH FOUHY, Associated Press Writer and edited by Michael Brittingham

WASHINGTON - Hillary Rodham Clinton suspended her pioneering campaign for the presidency on Saturday and summoned supporters to use "our energy, our passion, our strength" to put Barack Obama in the White House.

"I endorse him and throw my full support behind him," said the former first lady, delivering the strong affirmation that her one-time rival and other Democratic leaders hoped to hear after a bruising campaign.

Amid tears from her supporters, Clinton issued a call for unity that emphasized the cultural and political milestones that she and Obama, the first black to secure a presidential nomination, represent.

"Children today will grow up taking for granted that an African-American or a woman can, yes, become the president of the United States," she said.

For Clinton and her backers, it was a poignant moment, the end of an extraordinary run that began with an air of inevitability and certain victory. About 18 million people voted for her; it was the closest a woman has come to capturing a nomination.

"Although we weren't able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time, thanks to you, it has about 18 million cracks in it and the light is shining through like never before," she said in a speech before cheering supporters packed into the ornate National Building Museum, not far from the White House she longed to occupy, as president this time.

Indeed, her speech repeatedly returned to the new threshold her candidacy had set for women. In primary after primary, her support among women was a solid bloc of her coalition. She noted that she had received the support of women born before women could even vote.

But her main goal was to heal the rift in the party — one that cleaved Democrats in part by class, by gender and by race.

"The way to continue our fight now to accomplish the goals for which we stand is to take our energy, our passion, our strength and do all we can to help elect Barack Obama, the next president of the United States," she said.

"Today as I suspend my campaign, I congratulate him on the victory he has won and the extraordinary race he has run. I endorse him and throw my full support behind him and I ask of you to join me in working as hard for Barack Obama as you have for me," the New York senator said in her 28-minute address. Loud boos competed with applause.

With that and 13 other mentions of his name, Clinton placed herself solidly behind her Senate colleague from Illinois, who awaits Arizona Sen. John McCain in the general election. "We may have started on separate journeys but today, our paths have merged," Clinton said.

Obama, in a statement from Chicago where he was spending the weekend, declared himself "thrilled and honored" to have Clinton's support.

"I honor her today for the valiant and historic campaign she has run," he said. "She shattered barriers on behalf of my daughters and women everywhere, who now know that there are no limits to their dreams. And she inspired millions with her strength, courage and unyielding commitment to the cause of working Americans."

Obama secured the 2,118 delegates needed to clinch the nomination Tuesday after primaries in South Dakota and Montana. Aides said Obama watched Clinton's speech live on the Internet. His campaign put a photo of the New York senator on its Web site and urged supporters to send her a message of thanks. Likewise, Clinton's Web site thanked her backers. "Support Senator Obama today," her Web page said. "Sign up now and together we can write the next chapter in America's story."

Party leaders welcomed the new alliance.

"As you may know, I was a boxer. And I've seen many fights go the distance," said Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada. "But never have I seen one where everyone came out stronger — until now. Because of the unprecedented number of new voters and the tremendous amount of enthusiastic supporters all the Democrats brought to the primary process, we stand ready to win the White House in 2008."

Both Obama and Clinton stood to gain from the new collaboration.

Obama could use the women and blue-collar voters who flocked to Clinton's campaign. She could benefit from his prodigious fundraising to help retire a debt of as much as $30 million. Clinton loaned her campaign at least $11.4 million; by law only, she has until the summer Democratic convention to recoup it.

Clinton also has told colleagues she would be interested in joining Obama as his running mate. On Saturday, the Rev. Jesse Jackson, an Obama supporter, said she had made "a powerful case for her eligibility" to be on the ticket.

Joining Clinton on stage Saturday were her husband, the former president, and their daughter, Chelsea, to loud cheers from the crowd. When she spoke, they stepped away. Her mother, Dorothy Rodham, watched from the floor to the side of the stage and wiped away a tear.

In deciding to suspend her campaign, Clinton kept some options open. She gets to retain her delegates to the nominating convention this summer and she can continue to raise money. It also means she could reopen her campaign if circumstances change before the Denver convention, but gave no indication that was her intention.

As soon as Clinton finished speaking, some of the nearly 300 Democratic party leaders and elected officials across the country who had pledged their support to her as superdelegates released statements announcing they now back Obama. The switchers included some of Clinton's most high-profile supporters, including Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, Maryland Sen. Barbara Mikulski and Maine Gov. John Baldacci.

Clinton supporters began lining up at dawn to attend the farewell address. A smattering of Obama backers showed up as well, saying they did so as a gesture of party unity.

As they awaited her arrival, campaign staffers milled the room, exchanging hugs and saying goodbye.

Clinton seemed almost buoyant in her address, feeding off the energy of a loud and appreciative crowd.

"Well, this isn't exactly the party I planned but I sure like the company," she said as she opened her speech.

Clinton backers described themselves as sad and resigned. "This is a somber day," said Jon Cardinal, one of the first in line. Cardinal said he planned, reluctantly, to support Obama in the general election. "It's going to be tough after being against Obama for so long," he said.

Republicans quickly launched a "Clinton vs. Obama" page on the Republican National Committee's Web site drawing attention to her criticism of Obama during the campaign.

President Bush praised the symbolism of the 2008 field.

"I thought it was a really good statement, powerful moment when a major political party nominates an African-American man to be their standard bearer," he said in an interview Friday with an Italian journalist. "And it's good for our democracy that that happened. And we also had a major contender being a woman. Obviously Hillary Clinton was a major contender. So I think it's a good sign for American democracy."

On the Net:

www.hillaryclinton.com

www.barackobama.com

www.gop.com/clintonvsobama/

Obama's first test: Handling Hillary!

Photo: AP

Obama's first test: Handling Hillary

By ROGER SIMON | Edited by Michael Brittingham

The presumptive nominee may need to say no to his rival's push for the vice presidency.

Barack Obama would like to remind you of something: He won and she didn’t. It’s about him now and not her. He has made history, and she is history.

Not that Hillary Clinton admitted to any of that in her nonconcession concession speech Tuesday night, after Obama attained the delegate votes he needs for the Democratic presidential nomination

For someone giving indications she would like to be Obama’s running mate, Clinton was surprisingly ungracious. In fact, if you had just awakened from a (blissful) 17-month sleep, you would have thought she had won.

“Because of you, we won together the swing states necessary to get to 270 electoral votes,” she told the crowd in New York City. “I want the nearly 18 million Americans who voted for me to be respected, to be heard and no longer to be invisible.”

But her fighting words only increased the need for Obama to show that he can be strong, tough and in charge. Clinton’s unwillingness to recognize Obama as the victor only increased the need for Obama to act like a president and not like a doormat. And denying her a vice presidential slot may be a way of doing that.

See Also
Clinton appears open to VP slot
McCain draws sharp contrast with Bush, Obama
Senate superdelegates sit tight

It has been a hard-fought and sometimes bitter campaign, but Obama is not, one of his senior advisers assured me Tuesday night, going to spend a lot of time in the next few months wooing Clinton supporters whose feelings may be hurting.

“I think there are always immediate feelings of disappointment and anger,” Anita Dunn said. “But in the months ahead, he must appeal not just to the constituency groups who favored her in the primaries, but those he wants in the general election, and that includes independents and Republicans.”

Another Obama adviser, who asked not to be identified, said that he was not worried that Clinton supporters would stay angry.

“Look at how many switched today to Obama,” he said. “Look at the Clinton supporters, look at Maxine Waters [the congresswoman from California who endorsed Hillary Clinton in late January but switched to Obama on Tuesday], who were passionate advocates for Hillary, but who switched to Obama.”

“At the end of the day,” he went on, “Hillary supporters will look at John McCain and decide they are not going to vote for a man who will put judges on the Supreme Court who would overturn Roe v. Wade.”

The easiest way, the Obama campaign has decided, to turn the page away from Clinton is to go at McCain full bore, start the general election campaign immediately and ignore the media chatter about what Hillary does or does not want.

“Now is the appropriate moment to begin the general election discussion,” Dunn said. “That is why Sen. Obama chose Minnesota [the site of the Republican convention in September] for his speech.”

And while Obama spent a few moments praising Clinton in his speech in St. Paul, he spent most of his time attacking McCain, raising the issue he so effectively used against Clinton: the need for change.

“Change is a foreign policy that doesn’t begin and end with a war that should’ve never been authorized and never been waged,” Obama said. He used that argument against Clinton, it worked, and now he is going to use it against McCain again and again.

“Obama put his stake in the ground tonight for the general election campaign, just like McCain put his stake in the ground for the general election campaign,” a senior Obama adviser told me. “The story will shift to that. Obviously, the vice presidency will be part of the back story, but there is going to be a pretty active general campaign story going on."

McCain did his part by giving a major speech in New Orleans on Tuesday night. “I have a few years on my opponent, so I am surprised that a young man has bought in to so many failed ideas,” McCain said. “Like others before him, he seems to think government is the answer to every problem.”

But the three speeches — Clinton’s, McCain’s and Obama’s — showed off one of Obama’s great advantages: While McCain was reasoned and detailed, while Clinton had a few good lines, Obama soared.

“Behind all the labels and false divisions and categories that define us, beyond all the petty bickering and point-scoring in Washington, Americans are a decent, generous, compassionate people,” he said. “America, this is our moment. This is our time.”

It was, after a momentous struggle, Barack Obama’s time Tuesday night. And he made sure everybody knew it.